lee materazzi

“HIDING UNDER MY MOTHERS DRESS”/C-PRINT/101,5 CM X 137 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

LEE MATERAZZI / JUNE 2012 / PAGE 2/3

fINDING MYSELfAT HOME

Morten Poulsen

The first time I saw a work by Lee Mater-azzi, was two years ago at Pulse Contempo-rary Art fair in New York. The photograph I was faced with, depicted a man that on a bizarre way had got himself wrapped in a ladder, going down a staircase head first. In that way Lee Materazzis art, showing small everyday oddities becomes big, entertain-ing stories about man’s fumbling way across the globe. I immediately fell for her photographs and included her in the Gallery Poulsen group exhibition “Bitches Brew - New Art from New York (part 2)” in 2011.

We are now proud to present her first solo exhibition in Denmark, “finding Myself at Home.”

Lee Materazzis photographs hit you with great force, they are spontaneous and fun and looking at them simply makes you happy. But you also bump into them - they do indeed have a sharp edge that you cut

yourself on. That’s because her bizarre uni-verse, that is distorted and caricatured, has a special touch with the contemporary. She manages to capture the mood that the world finds itself in right now, where every day seems to bring new, unexpected prob-lems; the things we thought were given fall apart and changes. The same happens in Lee Materazzis photographs – with her ab-surd pictures of everyday situations, she cuts holes in the life we thought was solid, quiet and stable.

Lee Materazzi already has a great career, and I predict that the succes will continue. It is therefore a great pleasure to present her here at Gallery Poulsen.

Welcome!

Morten Poulsen

‘MY LIfE IS VERY CALM

AND ORDERLY, NOTHING

TOO CRAZY’LEE MATERAZZI, 2012

“UNDER THE RUG, UNDER THE PIANO”/C-PRINT/86,5 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

“UNDER THE RUG, UNDER THE PIANO”/C-PRINT/86,5 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

“SITTING UNDER MY GRANDfATHER´S CHAIR”/C-PRINT/86,5 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011


“IN BETWEEN A PATH”/C-PRINT/137 CM X 101,5 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

‘DAILY ACTIVITIES

HAVE A VERY CALMING

EffECT fOR ME’LEE MATERAZZI, 2012


“CLOSET SHELf”/C-PRINT/155 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

‘MOST Of MY INSPIRATION

COMES fROM EVERY DAY ROUTINES’

LEE MATERAZZI, 2012


“BETWEEN 2 CHAIRS”/C-PRINT/86,5 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

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Interview with Lee MaterazziBy Tom Hermansen, 2012

The title of the show is “finding myself at home”, why?

>>“finding Myself at Home” was chosen as the title for this body of work because of a duality of meaning. Being a home-body, I literally spend a lot of time at home. The title also sug-gests the finding of an identity within one’s home. Inherently when a person spends a lot of time in their home it can make them feel lost and can challenge their sense of self. The im-ages in the show are meant to portray this self-inflicted struggle of loosing and finding one’s self.<<

How is your own home? Crazy and messy or cozy and calm?

>>My home is very warm and peaceful. I am a bit of a home-body so it has always been important to me to have my home as a place of sanctuary. Inevitably, this is why the domestic setting is very prevalent in my work. My life is also very calm and orderly, nothing too crazy. It is perhaps the contrast be-tween a stable home and then the disorder within my work that I am truly content.<<

How did you get into making art?

>>Initially, I studied garment design in Miami, florida. I had an empty slot in my school schedule so I took a sculpture class. Gradually both of these interests began to merge to-gether. I became very interested in making props to be used in relation to the body and would document this with photog-raphy. As time progressed I became more interested in ideas of the absurd and the spectacle oppose to the practical func-tion of design. from there I went on to study sculpture at Cen-tral St. Martins in London where I was able to further experi-ment with the body as a sculptural element and as a device to deviate from everyday life.<<

This may be too freudian, but how was your childhood?

>>As a young child I moved around a lot but settled in Miami, when I was 7 with my mother and brother. I can’t say that my upbringing was anything unusual. It was actually very bal-anced. As I got older I did certainly rebel against the order of such a calm and predictable life style and craved for some-thing completely different. So, perhaps from a freudian per-spective, my work aims to both recreate and then destroy the mundane balance of my childhood. To get closer to my child-hood I turn towards structure, and to then claim indepen-dence I upset that very structure.<<

Miami has a reputation of being fun and colorful but also kitschy and superficial. How did the city affect your work?

>>I grew up in a suburban part of Miami and then returned again after college where I lived closer to the arts districts (Wynwood and the Design District). I returned because it is an excellent place to live as an artist. There is a lot of motivation to cultivate the arts and see things grow. I currently live in San francisco, which is also a wonderful city for the arts but I can’t say that I have found the same community that Miami has… In terms of Miami and its kitsch; I think that this is a humor of the city that a lot of artists embrace, comically and ironically. Miami certainly has more substance than just the kitsch but every once in a while it does inspire some of the aesthetic decisions I make, for example I shot a piece with my mothers head crowded into a swan shaped mailbox. I’m not sure if you could find that just anywhere...<<

Today, wow is your daily routine and where do you find inspi-ration?

>>In fact, most of my inspiration comes from my every day routines. This is where I have my most creative revelations; Grocery shopping, doing the laundry, or organizing things such as a closet or sock drawer. Such daily activities have a very calming effect for me… getting back to the possible freudian explanation behind my work.<<

You seem to cherish the small things in everyday-life. Do we generally forget to appreciate the small day-to-day miracles?

>>I find much significance in the small somewhat mundane details of life. A lot of the time the small things can be great metaphors for an understanding of the bigger picture. It is very easy for people to overlook routines within their life, as it is the big eventful moments that stand out more. I have never been one for the monumental but rather the simple and un-derstated.<<

The Dada movement in the beginning of the 1900s also fo-cused on small, weird things. Art historically, where are your inspirations?

>>Dada, the Situationists, fluxus, and many contemporary artists working today inspire me. from Dada, specifically, I would say that my work possesses the same reasoning of finding sense in non-sense. Dada sought to go against the grain of the establishment and create anarchy. My work fol-lows this agenda but in a very ironic sense. The rebellion demonstrated within my work is a futile effort. The comic di-sasters of the subjects are equally as important as their initial efforts to break out of conformity. It is the self-defeatist hu-mor of the work that truly accomplishes something.<<

The avant-garde movements that you mention wanted to dis-tort the established society. Is that a thought you share?

>>I believe that in pronouncing one thing you both accom-plish that and the opposite. In other words, by rebelling against the established order of society you also enforce that order. Within my work, I do set out to distort the conventions in society but most of the time the point is the failure to actu-ally do so.<<

The leading situationist André Breton said that his ultimate art work would be to take a gun and shoot into a crowd; to tear the capitalist society apart. Was the avant-gardes too radical and did that in the end lead to their own suicide?

>>I feel that the dissipation of many collectives in art is due to the making of rules; of creating a system of how things should be done and what art should be. As soon as that hap-pens there naturally comes the innate need to rebel against that order. I believe that is how the Situationst movement came to an end. However, I would by no means say that this end was a suicide. I believe that they paved a path for many new ideas, both within life and art.<<

The avant-garde movements could be brutal, even violent - and in some of your photos the persons seem to be in painful situations. Is life painful?

>>Many of the subjects are in vulnerable or painful situa-tions and ironically the situations that they are in is meant as an escape from something else much more docile. Person-ally I find complacency and stagnation the most painful as-pects of life, whilst burying myself in the backyard or hanging from the kitchen table is much more soothing. I suppose pain is trivial in this way.<<

Your work has been compared to the contemporary Austrian artist Erwin Wurm. What is your view on his art?

>>My work has frequently been compared to the work of Erwin Wurm, of whom I am a fan. Where our work is similar is the everydayness, the portrayal of the ordinary in an absurd way. I believe that the work of Wurm is more objective than mine, referencing the history and evolution of sculpture such as in his “One Minute Sculptures” where he made a sculpture using the human body in a minute. A part of the work was the challenge to create a sculptural composition under the pres-sure of spontaneity. My work on the other hand can be very subjective and premeditated; it specifically speaks of some-thing happening in my life.<<


‘THE IMAGES ARE MEANT TO PORTRAY

THIS SELf-INfLICTED STRUGGLE Of

LOOSING AND fINDING ONE’S SELf’

LEE MATERAZZI, 2012


“LEVEL WITH THE BACKYARD”/C-PRINT/63,5 CM X 47,5 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

‘A LOT Of THE TIME THE SMALL THINGS

CAN BE GREAT METAPHORS fOR AN UNDERSTANDING Of

THE BIGGER PICTURE’LEE MATERAZZI, 2012


“HANGING IN THE CLOSET”/C-PRINT/162 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

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‘I HAVE NEVER BEEN ONE fOR

THE MONUMENTAL BUT RATHER THE

SIMPLE AND UNDERSTATED’

LEE MATERAZZI, 2012


“WALL PAPER”/C-PRINT/63,5 CM X 86,5 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

“HANGING ONTO MY KITCHEN TABLE”/C-PRINT/63,5 CM X 86,5 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011


“BASEMENT DOOR”/C-PRINT/86,5 CM X 117 CM/EDITION Of 5/2011

CV AND EXHIBITIONSLEE MATERAZZI

Education

2002 - 05 Central St. Martins, London Institute, London, UKBA/ fine Arts

Solo Exhibitions

2012finding Myself at Home, Gallery Poulsen, Copen-hagen, DK

2011Spaces with Meaning, Quint Contemporary, Art LA, Los Angeles, CA

2010feels Like Home, Spinello Gallery, Miami, fL

2009Cluttered, Spinello Gallery, Pulse, Miami, fL

Making Space, Quint Contemporary, La Jolla, CA

2008In Between Places, Spinello Gallery, Miami, fL

2007Work, The front Room, Miami, fL

Museum Exhibitions

2011florida Contemporary 2011, Naples Museum of Art, florida

2009Quint: Three Decades of Contemporary Art, Cali-fornia Center for the ArtsEscondido, CA

Selected Group Exhibitions

2011Bitches Brew - New Art from New York (Part II) Gallery Poulsen, Copenhagen, DK

Abe’s Penny Live, curated by Anna Knoebel & Tess Knoebel, Miami, fL

2010Littlest Sister, Spinello Gallery, Miami, fL Hope Blossoms, The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse, Miami, fL

Mystic Visage, curated by Desiree Cronk, World Class Boxing, Miami, fL

Knock Knock: Who’s There? That Joke Isn’t funny Anymore, curated by Sarah Murkett & Elena Ru-binfeld, fred Torres Collaborations, New York, NY

Abracadadra, curated by Anthony Spinello, Art & Culture Center of Hollywood, fL

2009The Scholl Collection, curated by Trevor Schoon-maker, Miami, fL

101, HoW to Make A Gallery A Home, Spinello Gal-lery, Miami, fL

Confection, OHWOW, Miami, fL

2008Schedenfrau, curated by Daniel Newman, Design District, Miami, fL

The Continuing Adventures of Our Heroine, cu-rated by Aramis Gutierrez and Pepe Mar, David Castillo Gallery, Miami, fL

2007 Littlest Sister, Spinello Gallery, Miami, fL

Little Boxes, Spinello Gallery, Miami, fL

Confluence: A Collaboration, frederick Snitzer Gallery, Miami, fL

2006The Tupperware Party, Red Dot Project, Miami, fL

2005C Print, Wynwood Arts District, Miami, fL

A Private View, Merc Studios, Miami, fL

Wearable Expressions, Palos Verde Art Center, Palos Verde, CA

Public Collections

The Margulies Collection at the Warehouse, Mi-ami, fL

World Class Boxing, The Collection of Debra & Denis Scholl, Miami, fL

The Collection at the Sagamore Hotel, Miami, fL

Selected Art fairs

2012ArtLA, Quint Contemporary

2011Scope NY, Spinello Gallery

2010MACO Mexico, Spinello Gallery

2009Photo LA, Spinello Gallery

Pulse Miami, Spinello Gallery2008Circa Puerto Rico, Spinello Gallery

Pulse New York, Spinello Gallery

2007Pulse Miami, Spinello Gallery

Toronto International Art fair, Spinello Gallery

Scope New York, Spinello Gallery

Art LA, Spinello Gallery

Scope Miami, Spinello Gallery

Scope Hamptons, Spinello Gallery

2006Nova Art fair Chicago, Red Dot Project

Scope New York, Spinello Gallery

Scope Miami, Spinello Gallery

Scope Hamptons, Spinello Gallery

2005Scope Hamptons, Spinello Gallery

Bibliography

PrintSegal, Gilad. Spaces with Meaning, Published by Quint Contemporary, January 2011

Hsieh, Catherine. Homecoming, New York Arts Magazine, fall 2011

Pajot, S. Cindy Sherman and Lee Materazzi Get

Behind the Mask at World Class Boxing, Miami New Times,July 2, 2010

Wilton, Kris. Have You Heard the One About the Urnial?, Artinfo, April 2, 2010.

Laster, Paul. Photo Gallery: Art That Makes You Laugh, flavorwire, April 2, 2010

Tschida, Anne. food fight! Laundry Duty! Pic-tures from the Domestic Stuggle, Knights Arts, May 14, 2010.

Hood, John. NiteTalk: Losing Our Heads for Lee Materazzi. NBC Miami, May 17, 2010

Maza, Erik. Spinello Gallery Sells $5,000 Washing Machine New Times Miami, May 17, 2010

Kleinman, Rebecca. The People Who Make Miami, March 2010

Pincus, Robert L. Visual fantasies, San Diego Union Tribune, March 12, 2009

Barrenechea, Victor. female but Maybe Not fem-inist, Biscayne Times, Volume 6, Issue 8.

De Jesus. Carlos Suarez. Heads Down, Miami New Times, June 12, 2008

Triff, Alfredo. Desnudo y paradoja sin rostro en la fotografia, El Nuevo Herald, June 3, 2008

Dunlop, Beth. Beauty in Truth, Home Miami, De-cember 2007

De Jesus, Carlos Suarez. Miniart Art, Miami New Times, November 22, 2007

Sinclair, Aimee. An Interview with Thomas Hol-lingworth & Lee Materazzi Gallery Diet, August 2007

Tschida, Anne. CULTURE SURGE: Photo flourish, Category 305, January 26, 2006

De Jesus, Carlos Suarez. Sugar and Spice Girls,

Miami New Times, March 2006

VideoBilowit, Bill & Orihuela, Grela. Wet Heat Project, http://wetheat.tv/A-Roll_Materazzi.html

Vigliotti, Jonathan & Scholl, Dennis, Plum TV:Lee Materazzi, http://miamibeach.plumtv.com/videos/lee_materazzi


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